After years of planning and renovation work, New York’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center has awakened interest in the “city that never sleeps” with a major upgrade of its 15-story curtain wall and interior structural space frame featuring eye-opening protective coatings from Tnemec.
“It’s a beautiful building,” shared coating consultant Phil Gonnella of the Righter Group, Inc. “We are proud that Tnemec coatings were chosen for the interior structural space frame when the convention center was built, as well as for its latest renovation.”
Constructed in the mid-1980s, all of the center’s structural steel framing was primed and protected with Series 66 Hi-Build Epoxoline, a polyamide epoxy coating. More than 16,000-gallons of Series 66 were shop-applied to the exposed steel space frame consisting of 76,000 individual pipe tubes and 19,000 connecting nodes.
Fast forward nearly 30 years to the $463 million renovation of the center that included the installation of a 6.75-acre green roof, and the replacement of a mirrored glass curtain wall with low-energy translucent glazing. The structural space frame and underside deck were also recoated with nearly 12,000-gallons of light grey Series 115 Uni-Bond DF, a high-performance hydrophobic acrylic coating with “dry-fall” characteristics that reduce the potential for overspray issues.
“Series 115 is low odor, it sprayed on like a dream and dried quickly, it adhered to the old Series 66 and other coatings, and it did not interfere with construction work going on in the center,” Gonnella explained. “The custom color, Javits Gray 1, and standard color, Sinker, were visually compatible with the transparent glass in the curtain wall.”
Structural steel outside the center was primed with Series 90-97 Tneme-Zinc, a two-component, zinc-rich urethane primer, followed by an intermediate coat of Series 27 F.C. Typoxy, a versatile polyamide epoxy, and a finish coat of Series 73 Endura-Shield, an aliphatic acrylic urethane.
Kiosks and booths inside the center were recoated using Series 10 Tnemec Primers, and water-based, low volatile organic compound (VOC) High Dispersion Pure acrylic polymer coatings, Series 1028 Enduratone and Series 1029 Enduratone. Series 135 Chembuild, a modified polyamidoamine epoxy, was also used for abrasion-andcorrosion-resistance on selected applications.
Located on the West Side of midtown Manhattan, the Javits Center was designed by James Freed of I.M. Pei and Partners. The center is named for Jacob Javits, who served as U.S. Senator from New York from 1957 to 1981.